


Noctium Somniorumque

by SerenLyall



Series: Star Wars Tumblr Prompts [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Humor, en-route to bespin, with a little dash of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-02
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 14:47:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13237977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SerenLyall/pseuds/SerenLyall
Summary: It begins with a scream.





	Noctium Somniorumque

**Author's Note:**

> "A Han and Leia en-route to Bespin? What leads up to them sleeping together for the first time? -anonymous"

A scream shatters the peace of ship’s night to a hundred thousand spinning shards. Han bolts upright in his bunk, adrenaline screaming, blood pounding, hands already seeking his blaster, which hangs in its holster from a hook above his bed. It takes him two fast, shuddering breaths to remember where he is, and who is with him on the ship: Chewie, Threepio, Leia.

_Leia_.

He is out of his bed faster than his thoughts can track, the floor sharp and cold against his bare feet. The door hisses open before his nose, and then he is out in the dimly lit corridor, the grates of the floor echoing hollow and concussive beneath the drumbeat of his footsteps.

Another scream shivers through the air, drowning the hum of the engines underfoot, the hush of recycled air filtering through the vents. Somewhere behind him, Han thinks he hears Chewie howl a worried question. He calls, without looking behind him, “I’ve got this.” He hopes he isn’t lying.

Then her door is before him, and Han is faced with a quandary: bolt through the door and face whatever demons Leia is battling, or call her name and bang on the door, giving her enough time to force her demons back behind the walls she so perfectly keeps them locked behind.

Han opens her door.

“Leia.”

Her name is a soft sonata on his tongue, unexpected and accidental. It is soft, a whisper against the third scream that flays Han’s ears. He knows she could not–can not–hear him. And yet…and yet, as her name falls from his lips, Han watches her arched back slump down to the mattress, the taut energy, which had been throwing her into spasms, bleeding out of her body like blood through sand.

“Leia,” Han says again, and he is at her bedside. He lands on his knees, and he reaches for her with gentle hands.

She shivers beneath his touch, shudders instinctively away from his fingers. When he reaches for her again, saying her name as he touches her shoulder, she jolts. Her eyes open.

“Hey, easy,” Han says when she sits up fast enough to knock his hand away. “It’s okay.”

She is trembling.

“What are you doing in here?” Leia asks. Her voice is thin and small–smaller than Han thinks he has ever heard. If he did not know her better, he would think that her voice was filled with tears.

“You were screaming,” Han says. “I think you were having a nightmare.”

Leia nods. Han thinks she doesn’t mean to.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

She shakes her head. There is a pause, pregnant and painful, but then, in an even softer, smaller voice, her eyes fixed on the sheets pooled in her lap, Leia says, “I wish I could stop seeing it.”

“Seeing what?” Han asks, wishing he didn’t have to–that he could know her mind as well and readily as he sometimes dreams.

Leia looks up at him. Her eyes are dark–darker than dark–and filled with an unknowable agony. 

And Han knows what she will not say.

_Alderaan._

“Oh, Princess,” Han says. This time there is no hidden barb in the nickname. Only kindness.

Han rises from his knees and perches on the edge of her bed. He opens his arms, and says softly, “May I?”

She nods.

Han closes the space between them and wraps her in his arms. Her head tucks neatly beneath his chin, and her body fits against his like a long-forgotten memory. She is warm, and solid, and so very real it almost hurts.

“It’s okay,” Han murmurs, pressing the words into Leia’s hair. She trembles, and Han wonders if she hates him for saying what must sound like a lie–but if she does, she does not pull away.

They sit there, like that, for a long moment. And then that moment turns into two, then into five. And still Leia sits against him, face buried into his chest, the top of her head resting beneath his chin, his arms tight around her. 

He feels as her trembling eases into shivers. He feels as her breath calms from a rapid, desperate staccato to a deep, even tempo.

And then, almost before he can realize what has happened, she is asleep.

Han shifts, tries to slide her back down onto her pillow. But at the movement she whimpers, and her fists curl into the front of his nightshirt.  Han freezes.

“Okay then, Princess,” he says softly, when her grip does not loosen. He shifts again, this time so that he can put his back against the wall, and readjusts his grip on her. He does not loosen his hold, however, and Leia does not wake.

He does not know how long he sits there, Leia cradled in his arms, But eventually he, too, falls asleep.


End file.
